


Some Things That Have Not Yet Come To Pass

by ladivvinatravestia



Series: I Scry [3]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bullying, High School, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Original Characters - Freeform, Peer Pressure, Pre-War, Sharing a Bed, Supernatural Elements, Teasing, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-17
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-12-17 07:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21050657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladivvinatravestia/pseuds/ladivvinatravestia
Summary: Bucky goes to a seance and gets more of a scare than he anticipated.





	Some Things That Have Not Yet Come To Pass

**Author's Note:**

> For spooktober prompt "seance".
> 
> Characters drink alcohol while they are aged 18 in this fic. This is the legal age for purchasing and consuming alcohol where I live. I did not look into what the legal age would have been in pre-war New York and my intention was that the characters were drinking when they knew it would be breaking the rules to do so. If "underaged" drinking will distress you, you may want to steer clear of this fic.

"No," says Steve, crossing his arms.

"Aw, Stevie, please?" says Meg, putting a hand on his arm and batting her eyelashes at him.

"You'll all have more fun without me," says Steve, digging his heels in.

"Aw, little Stevie's scared," sneers Mikey.

"Cut it out," says Steve. "I'm not going." He clenches his fists and glares, even though Mikey is now a full head taller than him. Bucky clenches his fists, too, and Mikey backs off.

"But what if Ruthie gets scared?" Meg persists. "Maybe she'll need to hold your hand."

Ruthie turns to Molly and says, "Ew, no," and Steve says,

"Then she can hold Bucky's hand."

Meg purses her lips but accepts that Steve isn't going to attend. "Tomorrow night at eleven, Bucky," she says. "Don't be late." And she and Mikey head off, arm in arm.

~~

That afternoon after school, Bucky tries to get Steve to say why he doesn't want to go to Meg's party. It doesn't have anything to do with the girls, he thinks - Steve had already declined the invitation before they started mocking him, so it must be something else.

"It's just, you know, the Donnellys have that cat, and you know how that sets off my asthma," he says. It's a lie and Bucky can't figure out why he's lying, but he must have his reasons.

Bucky doesn't really want to go out to a party that Steve's not going to be at, but at least Meg and Mikey invited Steve, which is a step up from some of the other parties that have been held this year. And anyway, there will be a bunch of girls there, and they might get scared and want to hold his hand. Maybe one of them will set his heart racing the way Steve does.

~~

Bucky shows up to the Donnellys' right on time the next night. Mr. and Mrs. Donnelly have gone upstate to stay with their oldest daughter while she has her second baby, leaving Meg in charge of the apartment and her younger siblings. She, in turn, has sent the siblings to stay with their friends for the weekend and is opening up the home to her classmates for a party and a seance. Which will probably turn into a weekend of drinking and, probably, heavy petting. Is that the part that Steve objects to?

The girls all show up in their best dresses, and the other boys, like Bucky, are in their best suits. Meg is circling the room, pouring people drinks like she's a real grown-up hostess, and Bucky soon finds himself, drink in hand, stuck in a conversation with Joe and Ollie about which of the girls is most likely to be willing to go all the way. Bucky feels awkward and out of place, like he often does when the other boys start talking about girls. None of them are old enough yet to start thinking about girls like that, but so many of the boys talk like that's all they can think about. Or, well, most of them are eighteen now, including Bucky. Maybe they _are_ old enough to start thinking about girls like that, in which case, what's wrong with Bucky?

Finally around a quarter to midnight, Meg claps her hands for attention and directs everyone to sit down in a circle on the ground. She's laid out a dark tablecloth and set out a circle of votive candles in the centre. As people are seating themselves, she lights the candles and then turns off the electric lights.

"Okay, everyone cross your arms and then take hands with the person next to you," Meg directs. Bucky finds himself between Ruthie and Doris.

"Now what?" says one of the boys, after the circle has been formed.

"Now we call on the spirits," says Meg. She closes her eyes and affects a very serious expression. "O spirits, we call on you to enter our circle - everyone repeat after me - "

The assembled crowd dutifully repeats her words, though not without some snickering and deliberate mishearing. Meg says another phrase, and then another, with the others repeating her. The whole thing is a bit silly, really, and it reminds Bucky of the time a few years ago when he and Steve had tried to summon images of the girls they would marry. Steve had seemed withdrawn and upset after that. Did he see something he didn't want to see? No, he'd been mad about how Mrs. Gallagher blamed the whole thing on Bucky being Jewish. That still didn't explain why -

The candles all suddenly flicker and gutter in a cold gust of wind that washes through the room. Ruthie's and Doris' grips on his hands tighten, and then all eyes in the room snap open and focus on Bucky.

"James Buchanan Barnes," the other guests all say in unison. It's not the same joking chorusing as when they'd been repeating Meg's summons. There's an eerie precision as though one mind only is speaking through all the combined voices.

"Nice joke, everyone," says Bucky, even though he doesn't feel that amused. Their class has always been full of pranksters, but making a joke at someone else's expense is just mean.

"This is no joke," the voices say. "We are the men, the women, and the children who you will kill."

"What the hell kind of trick do you think this is?" demands Bucky, going rapidly from annoyed to incensed. He starts to stand up from the circle, but Doris' and Ruthie's fingers tighten around his hands, crushing his fingers with more strength than he thought they had.

"We forgive you, Bucky Barnes," say the voices. "You were not acting of your own free will."

"I'm getting out of here," Bucky mutters, and the girls' hands suddenly go lax in his own. He stumbles to his feet. The candles stop flickering and the rest of the guests open their eyes, moving normally again.

"Bucky, where are you going?" asks Doris.

"It's just getting good," Mikey adds.

"Hmm-mmmm _I am the ghost of Grace Budd_ \- " begins Meg, an expression on her face apparently intended to convey that she's in communion with the spirits. It's nothing at all like what Bucky just saw. He scrambles for the door, not looking back. Who cares what his classmates say about him later?

~~

There's a knocking at Steve's window and he jumps. Serves him right, he supposes, for reading so late into the night about the grisly crimes Albert Fish is on trial for. When he sits up to see who or what is causing the knocking, he sees a brief glimpse of what looks like a masked man with shaggy dark hair, but then the image resolves and it's just Bucky. Really, who else would it be?

"I thought you were going to Meg's party?" he says, as Bucky climbs in through the window and onto Steve's bed. Steve had been interested in the party himself, until he learned that Meg proposed to have a seance. It was one thing having a vision of the future in front of Bucky, like he had a few years ago, but quite another risking having one in front of all his classmates when they were already looking for reasons to pick on him.

Bucky shakes his head. "I was there," he says. He kicks off his shoes and then leans back against the wall, scrubbing the heels of his hands over his eyes.

"And now you're not," says Steve. He scoots around on the bed so he's sitting next to Bucky, elbowing him gently in the ribs.

"Yeah, now I'm not," laughs Bucky, but Steve knows him well enough to know he's acting cheery on the outside in hopes his actual mood will catch up. "Stupid party anyway," he adds, more truthfully, and then, "I'd rather be here with you anyway." That part is the most true, though he can't possibly mean it the way Steve would like him to. He throws an arm around Steve's shoulders and pulls him in close so he can scrub his knuckles against Steve's scalp. Steve plays at fighting back, wishing they could still be openly physically affectionate with each other like they had when they were children, instead of whatever they are settling for now.

Whatever happened to Bucky at the party, he doesn't want to talk about it and he doesn't seem to want to turn the lights out and go to sleep, either. He does strip down to his undershirt and shorts, though, and lie down in the bed with Steve, and they stay up more than half the night talking. They talk about the books they're reading, what they think they're going to do after graduation, the worrying political developments coming out of Germany, the road trip they've always wanted to take to the Grand Canyon. 

Near dawn they must drift off, because Steve wakes again to late-morning sun streaming through the window and Bucky curled up behind him, back-to-back. He lets himself indulge, just for a moment, in the fantasy that he could wake up next to Bucky every day for the rest of his life. Then his Ma is quietly cracking his bedroom door open to peek in on him. He starts guiltily, but she just smiles, puts her finger to her lips in a shushing motion, and closes the door again. Steve closes his eyes. He can pretend just a little bit longer.

**Author's Note:**

> Visit me on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ladivvinatravestia), where my asks box is always open to prompts.


End file.
